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Why did Patty make the tape? The most pessimistic view was bluntly voiced by Vincent Hallinan, a 77-year-old San Francisco lawyer for the Hearsts, who said that he feared the kidnapers had forced the girl to deliver the statement, then killed her and fled, releasing the tape as a diversion. On the other hand, the girl could conceivably have spoken out because of fear, or to buy time, or to convince the terrorists that she had joined them so that she could later break free.
No one who knew Patty well thought she had become a dedicated revolutionary of her own free will in just 60 days of captivity. She was hardly a radical. Only a few weeks before the kidnaping, she had been happily picking out china in anticipation of her marriage to Steven Weed, 26, a graduate student at the University of California at Berkeley. But Dr. Frederick J. Hacker, a psychiatrist and expert on terrorism consulted by the Hearsts, does not discount the possibility that she made the tape voluntarily. He theorizes that the enormous psychological pressures of liv ng in danger for such a length of time could have induced Patty to change her opinions, at least temporarily. "Until we have full disclosure of what happened," Dr. Hacker said, "I would urge that the community look at this thing with a great deal of caution and charity."
Both the police and the FBI were proceeding on the assumption that Patty was still alive and being held against her will. One aspect of the case that they were looking into was whether there was any connection between the S.L.A. and the random street killings of twelve whites in San Francisco during the past five months. So far they have apparently found no link, though the FBI has identified most of the S.L.A. members who took part in the kidnaping. In one of their periodic taped messages, the abductors complained that the FBI was so close to them that they "couldn't breathe." That is true. At one time or other, the agents have been just hours behind the kidnapers.
FBI agents think that the S.L.A. spokesman who calls himself "General Field Marshal Cinque" may be only a front man used to divert attention from the cadre's real leaders, who may include Mrs. Nancy Ling Perry, 26, and other radical white women. Mrs. Perry is the daughter of a Santa Rosa, Calif., furniture dealer and a graduate of Berkeley—the same school that Patty was attending when she was seized. Until last fall, Mrs. Perry was living with Joseph Remiro, 27, and Russell Jack Little, 24, two white S.L.A. members who have been charged with the killing last November of Dr. Marcus A. Foster, a black who was Oakland's superintendent of schools.
Shot on Sight. Cinque is believed to be an escaped black convict named Donald D. DeFreeze. The theory that DeFreeze is not the true leader of the S.L.A. is supported by a man with a rare personal knowledge of the man and the organization. Colston Westbrook, 36, a black instructor in linguistics at Berkeley, met DeFreeze while visiting California's Vacaville prison to take part in the activities of the Black Cultural Association. The S.L.A. partly evolved from the group. Westbrook recalls De-Freeze as "a cat submerged in divine blackness and interested in black problems." But now, Westbrook says, "I think the honkies are calling the shots. He'd better wake up."